pearl clutching media and WATB Republicans.

Bravo, General.

It seems we are starting to win this thing.  The 'swift-boat' counter-accusation was just a bit too much of a stretch and the media already seems to be having some minor second thoughts.  Hmmm...  Stand and deliver, for once.

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark rejected suggestions he apologize Tuesday for saying John McCain's medal-winning military service does not qualify him for the White House.

Emphasis mine.

The media just can't stand the fact that their man is playing defense on his supposed strength. 2 great days of media coverage for Clark and his attack on the CIC McSame meme.

I think I've said it before but the way this has played out makes it seem as if the Democrats really have their shit together this year. Great strategic plan and almost flawless execution by all.

Bravo!

Good for Wes Clark! After Edwards dropped out I supported and voted for Obama but Gen. Clark's endorsement of Hillary Clinton certainly gave me pause. I still would like to see him as Obama's VP. Others have said this dust-up has taken him out of the running. I'm not so sure: he's determined, tough and would be a great help in ensuring a successful draw-down in Iraq.

Anyone who thinks that Clark was wrong probably isn't going to vote for anyone but McCain, anyway.  It is just common sense.

Someone needed to go after McCain on this front. Bravo for Clark doing it and sticking to his guns when counter-attacked.

He is braving some withering fire, fighting the good fight. It's really impressive to see a Dem actually play the Immovable Object to the MSM's Irresistible Force.

Sooner or later, the narrative has to change or this isn't news. If Clark can hold out that long, calling this a major point would be an understatement.

As long as he keeps Obama out of it, this is great!  MCCain has been itching for this fight (hoping that the "dirty f'n hippie" Obama will try to get revenge for Kerry in 2004)... he even had his bizarro-world swift boat group all set and ready to go...

But, surprise, he's got a four star general... leader of our last military victory, pounding on him relentlessly.  McCain is DESPERATE to get Obama into this fight, but he's being pinned down by a guy who seriously outranks him...

It's fantastic, really!  As long as Obama stays above the fray, it really helps...  but Obama has to stay out of it... let the general beat up the lousy pilot...  not Obama...  that's the way that it can work to our advantage...

As soon as Obama gets into the fray, it's military vs. democrat (i.e. hippie) and we lose the battle...  so, keep fighting like this, and we will be in good shape!

Why should anyone apologize for telling the truth? Clark just said that having your plane shot down doesn't qualify anyone for the presidency. That is the simple truth. Clark paid tribute to McCain's courage while a prisoner. Any questions?

The Republicans want to talk about a manufactured, non-existent outrage instead of the war in Iraq, the economy-lost homes and jobs, low wages- disintegrating highway infrastructure, incompetence, oil prices, medical care, etc., etc., etc. Who can blame them?

Sigh.

I wonder if Clark would've applied the same standard to Kerry, who voted for the war and also ran largely on his military record, in 2004.

And I don't like the somewhat disingenuous dismissing of Clark's comments as "inartful" either.  That immediately recalls Donald Rumsfeld.  Clark isn't being criticized because his statement wasn't poetic enough.

However, Obama's tack will succeed, as maybe it should, just like Bill Clinton's red herring in the 1996 debates about how no attack ever created a job, educated a child, etc. (even though Dole hadn't actually launched an attack).  It's entirely consistent with Obama's personality and character too.  As soon as I heard the flap over "You're likable enough" in NH, I knew that what Obama thought and meant was that the whole question was a silly, superficial one the candidates and media shouldn't be wasting time on.  At the same time, I knew it would hurt him, since it would come off as cold to most people (and consider how different the whole trajectory of January-June might've been had Obama done 2 points better in NH).  If you go back further, another example in this pattern is Obama's mocking the press for discussing Hillary's cleavage and how he looked in a bathing suit.  He's just a smart, thoughtful person who, like me, has little patience for nonsense.  In this case, he exhibited that superbly, unlike the NH debate.

I'm not sure about Clark's original remark.  My instinct is that it's anathema to an awful lot of heartland swing voters.  On the other hand, if we win the debate, we've pulled off something HUGE and awesome.  It's the sort of thing (like an impeachment vote) that you don't try unless you know you'll win.  I'm nervous, but I'll hope that Clark knows something I don't.  And I hope we can win this year without compromising away all intellectual honesty.  That job belongs to the DLC, if not the Republicans.

is beyond me.

I can think of nothing that McCain wants to talk more about than his military record.  

Obama distanced himself yesterday, and refused today to accept that he was responsible for Clark's comments today.  Good for him.

But trust me, the one thing Obama does not want the focus of this race on is experience.

Obama wants to make this race about judgement, not experience, as anyone with even a passing familiarity of the past 12 months would know.

Too bad Duke Cunningham isn't available as a Veep candidate for McCain. Wasn't Cunningham a much more decorated VietNam War "ace"?

Why doesn't Clark also go after McCain for saying today that he would still have invaded Iraq even if he had known back then that Iraq didn't have any WMD's?  

http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/1 13-07012008-1556942.html

Since the Iraq war is one of our most catastrophic military and political decisions, and since the vast majority of the American public agrees that we shouldn't have gone to war given that they didn't have WMD's, Obama, Clark, and every other Democratic surrogate under the sun should be hammering McCain about this 24/7, at every opportunity.

Why are the Dems not doing this?

Ugh, are you serious?  First, it saddens me to see the Democrat party stoop so low as to Swift Boat McCain. If Obama can't win without that....maybe it's better he shouldn't.

On a more practical level, I can't think of anything more likely to put off undecided voters than to attack a man who spent five years being tortured as a POW. Obama has NOTHING that remotely compares in his life history.  He really should have stayed far, far away from this.  

It's beyond disgusting. I can't believe I used to respect Clark, and even supported him as Obama's VP.

If the Democrats can't win without turning into the Republicans, they can forget about my vote. What the hell does the Democratic party stand for, if not rejecting Republican values and attitudes?  

If I have any disappointment over Clark's comments, it would be that by so speaking it appears he already knows that he is not to be the VP candidate.

Then again, it has been said that presidential candidates sometimes look for a veep that can function as the attack dog, while leaving the presidential candidate to work above the fray (ala Bush and Cheny). On that note, I'm heartened that Clark refuses to back away from his comments and Obama has not ostracized him.

Indeed, someone had to say what Clark has said. McCain's behavior as a POW was inspiring and heroic and speaks volumes to the testament of his personal character when confronted with personal deprivation and torture. But that was some 35 years ago, long before he married into huge wealth and got elected to the most privileged of the political class.

While McCain has so far not been shown to have fallen to the depths of corruption of former Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (a fellow Vietnam pilot and war hero) or been implicated in any of the Abramoff scandal, he still remains tainted by his 1989 association with the Keating Five scandal.

If McCain chooses to play up his war-time service as qualification for the presidency, than this Vietnam veteran (no medals, no heroics) sees no reason why General Clark, a similarly decorated war hero, can not question McCain's qualification.

If anything, I'm surprised no one has brought up the realization that McCain seems never to have been diagnosed or treated for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, as you would usually expect for anyone undergoing five years of imprisonment and  torture.

I also have to wonder why a guy at age 72 feels compelled to run for the presidency. Jeebuz, John. Is it what's right for America or what's right for John McCain's ego that drives you this late in the game?    

McDesperate himself once said that "anybody can get shot down."

But that was before he traveled on the Doubletalk Express.

The MSM handed McCain solid gold with their righteous indignation and outrage, but McCain's campaign undermined this by going completely bonkers rather than sitting back and letting the media do the work for them.  First, they dragged out Swift Boat Vets for Truth alumni, completely undermining their message, and then when Jim Webb entered the fray they started accusing Obama of orchestrating a conspiracy that left everyone shaking their head.  I can't understand why they would have done either of these things.

Clark took some heat but he was ultimately successful in unlocking the door that allows certain Democrats to rebuff McCain's postulation that his service record is executive experience for the Office of the Presidency.

The Washington Post makes some good points: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con tent/article/2008/07/01/AR2008070102480. html?tid=informbox

As for Clark as VP suddenly, that reeks of being the flavor of the day.  What about Anthony Zinni?  The generals Bush fired for saying they needed to send hundreds of thousands of troops?  If you want a bold, sharp tongue, there's Barney Frank and Jan Schakowsky.  If you want a radical loose cannon, we could undercut the Greens and put Cynthia McKinney on the ticket.

It seems a priori obvious to me that military experience does not qualify a person to be president.  (Is every vet, including the ones stuck in mental hospitals, fit to be president?)  Even McCain's.  Or for that matter, Eisenhower's (who used it to check the military-industrial complex).  But especially given the war and terror we have to deal with, it is certainly a relevant factor.  The problem is the incredibly dismissive way Clark treated McCain's military service and the outright disrespect for the torture he endured--which was because he wouldn't give information to his captors.  It's not that that--definitely not that alone--qualifies McCain to be president.  I, and I suspect almost everyone else here, would talk in a second.  Threatened with having my thumb cut off like in English Patient, or fingernails yanked out like in Syriana, I would do anything I thought would end the pain.  I'd choose my life over my country.  It's not that I'm proud of that; it's just the truth.  But McCain's choice of torture over compromising his country was undeniably courageous, principled, and honorable; and more than the vast majority of people would do.  Having grown up in the Midwest, I think most swing voters will see Clark's comments as a major foul.  That's not to say they'll blame Obama, but I don't think this helps.

I also kind of think it's a non-issue.  As Barack said, we have too many real issues to address.

If my clothes aren't done by now, I'm going to hurl the dryer at my landlord.

"Did you see the context in which Clark made that comment?"
<reporters start to mumble>
Then Obama would pick one of the reporters to say what the context was.
"Ok, so when you consider that Wes Clark was giving his opinion to Bob Shieffer based on the questions posed, do you consider what Clark said a lie or a smear?"
"Let me be clear, I would not have replied to such a line of questioning considering how some people could misuse that. But do you seriously think I would waste time on a non issue like that ? In the worst case, it is an inartful comment by Gen Clark who is also a military man"

When Clark brought up that scenario, ABC has to shut their mouths and did not know how to ask a followup question.

I am glad at least Obama is not asking Clark to apologize. No one should. It's time we went on the offensive. People will respect it in the long term. I am embarassed that after so many years of Republican intimidation, some of our Democrats are still trying to play by their rules.

Give me a break.  The piece of shit media is looking for a daily scandal so they have something to talk about.  Apparently discussing the policies of each candidate doesn't bring in the advertising revenue.

Last week it was Obama's illicit "e-mail relationship" with Scarlett Johanson.  This week its about Clark's comments.  Next week I am sure they will find something else Obama purportedly did wrong.

The funny thing is that none of this will matter in November if gasoline is still $4.00, if the economy is still in the tank.  No one will care about Scarlett Johanson or Wesley Clark.

the title 'still refusing' gives certain connotation to this topic - like he's somehow wrong to not be apologising. This may be the position of Obama, but it's plain WRONG. Clark has nothing to apologise for and not supporting him is purely counter-productive to the campaign and to Democratic long-term progress. with friends like these who needs enemies, comes to mind.

if anything OBAMA should be doing the apologising to Clark for tossing him under the bus rather than insisting the characterisations of clark taking hold in the MSM are wrong.

great for clark and good for Obama not going down the same lame path that Axelrod played out the other night.